Flood — Archuleta, Colorado

2025-10-11 to 2025-10-16 · near Arboles, Archuleta, Colorado

Event narrative

The Piedra River had a rapid rise in levels throughout the morning and afternoon of October 11th due to abundant rainfall starting on October 10th. It first crested to a preliminary level of 5.86 ft around midnight 10/12. A second crest occurred to a preliminary level of 7.26 ft on 10/14 around 1300 MST. This set a new record, beating the previous crest record of 6.4 ft which was set back on 9/6/1970. Most issues were adjacent to the 151 corridor north of Arboles where numerous drives were under water, one garage had some water in it. Forest Service Rd 613 did have some inundation but most bridges had several feet of clearance. USFS 613 which is parallel to the river did have water in some areas.

Wider weather episode

Between October 10-14, 2025, southwest Colorado experienced prolonged periods of rain and some of the largest multiday rainfall totals on record with rainfall accumulations between 3 and 8 inches, with locally higher amounts across the San Juan Mountains. Remnants from two tropical storms supplied anomalous moisture across the region, with minimal break between events. The first round of heavy rainfall resulted in flooding across La Plata and Archuleta counties from decaying Tropical Storm Priscilla beginning October 10 and continuing throughout the day on the 11th. There was a break in rain across the area on October 12, followed by a second round of heavy rain from October 13-14, associated with moisture from remnant Tropical Storm Raymond. Without much time between systems, the hydrologic response of the second storm was much faster than the first. Flooding across several counties in southwest Colorado spiked twice within the 5-day window, leading to major flooding and near record peaks along the Vallecito, Piedra and San Juan watersheds that lingered through the 16th before water levels receded. Numerous debris flows and rockslides also occurred as a result of the abundant rainfall.

View location on OpenStreetMap → (37.0497, -107.4131)

Source: NOAA Storm Events Database, event_id 1298394. Narrative written by the NWS forecast office that issued the report.